CUT. PASTE. PERFORM: A theater identity that invites imagination

■Context
NTGent breaks the mold of a traditional theater, much like Ghent itself – a city where rebellion is part of the DNA, where tradition meets confrontation, and where culture doesn’t sit still. When the institution set out to reimagine itself, it didn’t want a new logo. It wanted a new way to speak. BaseBRU and BaseDGTL were brought in not to design a brand, but to shape a system of expression – one that mirrors the theater’s new ethos: collaborative, raw, and alive.

Challenge
NTGent’s transition from centralized direction to collective authorship called for an identity built on openness. The communication needed to shift from polished messaging to shared authorship. A system that would let the creators – the playwrights, the directors, the people behind the scenes – have a visible hand in how the work is presented to the world. Something practical enough for the internal team to use, but expressive enough to carry the soul of the theater.

Solution
We built a system grounded in radical imagination. Visuals are constructed like dialogue – fragments, cut-outs, scribbles, tape, rough edges – leaving space for interpretation rather than spelling things out. We worked closely with NTGent’s internal task force to shape and test the system, building tools and training the team to use it freely and independently. The result reflects how the theater creates: collaboratively, instinctively, with both precision and mess. From motion to print, every piece feels made, not designed.

The centerpiece is a handwritten layer. Lines pulled directly from the plays, contributed by the playwrights in their own handwriting and integrated into posters, brochures, and digital formats. Authorship becomes visible. The writers don’t just write the play, they speak in the identity.

We didn’t define what the plays look like – we showed just enough to let the audience imagine. This wasn’t about branding. This was about giving a theater the tools to act – with as much imagination off stage as on it.